


Trial and Error, or How I didn't Learn to Cook and Almost Destroyed Everything

by Walpurgisnacht



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Humor, Nuclear Winter at the Future Foundation, dorks being dorks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-31
Updated: 2017-01-31
Packaged: 2018-09-21 05:38:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9534056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Walpurgisnacht/pseuds/Walpurgisnacht
Summary: This is a short story about a gentle thought, a not so gentle execution and the aftermath of that culinary disaster.





	

“What a terrible day” Kyouko Kirigiri murmured while exiting her room. She was in a bad mood because Makoto was away on a mission and she was forced to stay behind. Nothing dangerous, mind you. It was one of those routine missions that were her boyfriend’s bread and butter.  
A chore, to say it better.  
Besides it could go on for days and days, maybe even weeks. And she was not too fond of being separated from him for so long, especially since she moved into his apartment.  
That’s why she walked through the corridors sulking. While it sounded a bit silly, it seemed to her that everything was a little more grey without his presence.  
_Maybe I’m being too dramatic_ she thought. Nevertheless she didn’t like it.  
To add to her aggravated mind, she didn’t have much to do. Her day was almost like a holiday, her work was all done and she had time to spare. Time to wallow in melancholy.  
Whatever. She would survive.  
She took a glance at her watch. Almost three in the afternoon. So many hours to live in boredom.  
Maybe a drink would help her. She usually didn’t like to consume alcohol during working hours, but that was an exception. After all, a girl does what she can to uplift her spirit.  
Entering the Future Foundation’s lounge, she didn’t fail to notice it was empty. “Of course, people work at this hour” she said with a tinge of jealousy.  
She approached the counter and ordered a beer. No need to be fancy, not when nobody was watching.  
After a couple of sips the door came open again.  
What? Who else had nothing to do and could afford to dilly-dally?  
She couldn’t believe her own two eyes: it was Byakuya Togami, her esteemed deputy.  
“Really? Is this a bad joke?” she asked him. He didn’t flinch and took the seat next to hers, while asking for a beer himself.  
“You’re not the only one who can have an awful day, Kirigiri”.  
“Is that so? Are you here because Fukawa had to go with Naegi-kun?”.  
“Maybe. Or maybe I’m simply too good at my job and finished all the paperwork for this and the next month”.  
“Oh please, you can’t fool me. You miss her”.  
“As you miss him”.  
“I won’t deny it”.  
“Me neither”.  
“You surprise me, Togami”.  
He didn’t say anything back.  
They stayed like that for what seemed a long time, but probably amounted to fifteen minutes or so.  
Then…  
“Here you are, Togami! I was looking for you everywhere!” shouted Aoi Asahina from the door. The former Swimmer reached her friends and put something in front of Togami. “There, you left your tablet in the cafeteria” she said, returning the item to its owner. The Heir just nodded.  
“Wow, you two look so… gloomy” noticed Aoi. “What happened?”  
“Our days off officially started and we have nothing to do. Quite boring,” said Togami.  
“And he misses Fukawa,” added Kyouko, ignoring the stern look he shot at her.  
“Aww, it’s good to see you two being in love!” Aoi chirped. Togami grumbled, but his protest remained unanswered. The brunette tilted her head, looking pensive. “Why don’t you do a surprise to Naegi-kun and Fukawa-chan then? I mean, you both have free time and they’ll back in a few days, it would be a nice thing to do! You can cook for them, or doing all the laundry, and…”  
“Wait wait wait,” Togami stopped, “What do you mean they’ll back in a few days?” he asked. Aoi just blinked. “Oh, I thought you both know this. I heard Yukizome-san talking with Munakata-san about their mission, it seems they’re done and so they’ll be back this week-end.”  
Kyouko and Togami exchanged a meaningful look. She’s never been good at express how she feels, and most of the time she hid her feelings on purpose, wearing a mask on her face that started to crumble in pieces when she met Makoto. Togami wasn’t different from her, since he has been raised to think that love, friendship and the desire of bonding with someone were only obstacles on the road to success. Accepting his feeling for Touko hadn’t been an easy process for him, and still to this day he had problem in acting… well, _normal_ toward her.  
_But maybe this is a great opportunity for both of us._  
“I think it’s a great idea,” she smiled at Aoi. Togami glanced at her with a confused look in his eyes.  
Aoi clasped her hands. “I’m sure they will be! Now I have to go back to work, I’m not as lucky as you,” she moaned, heading back to the entrance. “See ya later!”  
Kyouko waved the hand at her friend, then she looked back to Togami. “A surprise for them, hm?” he said, rubbing his chin with two fingers. She nodded. “Why not? Makoto is the one that usually does most of the chores at home, and I’m sure it’s the same for Touko. It’s time to repay their patience with us.”  
The former Heir remained silent for a few seconds, then smiled. “I have to agree. After all, a Togami can’t refuse a challenge.”  
Kyouko rolled her eyes. Some things just never changed, not yet at least.

*

The first idea that popped in Kyouko’s mind was to cook a dinner for Makoto.  
It was simple, shallow even, but it was also something that would have always worked. And so that Friday morning she found herself browsing the aisles of the local grocery shop, picking up what she needed for her recipes. Makoto was the one that usually prepared meals for both of them, while she rarely made something different from a coffee or a sandwich.  
However Kyouko was sure it would be an easy task.  
How naive of her.  
“Oh, c’mon. I just have to emulate a thirtieth of Hanamura. It can’t be that difficult, can it?”.  
The cooking book she was holding like it was written in Martian responded “You’ve no idea how”.  
Really, it was like an ancient hieroglyph coming straight outta Assuan.  
Kyouko wasn’t and isn’t stupid, we all know that. But her brain refused to make the words she was reading as something rational.  
She placed the book on the table near the cooking counter, tried to read it for the last time, took a deep breath and said to herself that it was doable. People cooked every day, she wouldn’t be the one who can’t.  
_…_  
_Okay, maybe I didn’t need to make all the ingredients inside the double boiler to evaporate._  
_…_  
_Why does this mixture resemble a little mountain of poop?_  
_…_  
_My experience in this field is limited, but I don’t think that blob should be trying to move on his own._  
_…_  
_Call the exorcist! Call the exorcist!_  
_…_  
_Here is your inglorious end, new and unexpected form of life. Down the drain._  
_Enough with the cheesecake. He will make do without it._  
_Let’s try something simpler to start, shall we? Why don’t I try to bake some onigiri?_  
_Well, it’s settled then._  
So she needed rice, water, some seaweeds. As for the stuffing, she decided tuna with mayonnaise would be alright.  
“Let’s get this party started!” she shouted. Inwardly.  
The first step was to broil the rice. Twenty to thirty minutes.  
Easy.  
_And this is done. Now I just have to wait. How?_  
She glanced at her laptop, lazily forgotten on the couch. Why not, she thought. _I still have something to look at._  
After turning it on she opened the file where she kept reports, notes and whatever about work. Yes, she didn’t really need to do that but her Stakhanovite nature wouldn’t let her rest for even a minute.  
So she began virtually flipping through the pages, double and triple-checking things.  
In a bout of curiosity a Wikipedia page popped open. Because only one thing could overcome her being picky: the fascination with unresolved cases and conspiracies.  
Soon the world lost meaning to her.  
After what felt like a minute or two, she smelled something weird. It was like… brimstone, she would have said if she felt melodramatic.  
_What? Why so early?_  
A quick look at her cellphone watch.  
Like hell it was early. She had been busy for more than a hour.  
_Damn you, Taman Shud case! Damn you, Scientology! Damn you, New World Order! Damn it all._  
Her desperate rush was obviously too little, too late. In place of the rice there was a scorched mass of black thingies which were still roasting.  
Of course she didn’t even think to touch the pot, it probably had the Sun’s outward temperature.  
_...my life sucks. And my culinary skills do too._  
Contemplating the disaster, an obnoxious little voice in her head said that the mess couldn’t even be recycled for something like mochi.  
_I can’t believe I can screw up a task so basic. I’m a humanoid typhoon in the kitchen, it seems._  
Sure, she could have just put aside the dinner and make him another kind of surprise… a surprise both of them would have enjoyed for sure.  
_But… it’s like cheating. And we could do it regardless_ she thought, blushing a little. At that point, for Kyouko it was a matter of principle. Cooking was something she rarely did, so making a dinner for Makoto would have been a real surprise for him, that’s why she was so adamant to pursue her own plan.  
And so she opened again her cookbook, determined to find another recipe to make.  
_You can do it, Kyouko. It can’t be that hard._

*

In fact, it was even worse.  
“I suppose your idea isn’t going as you planned,” Togami said to Kyouko when she entered the apartment building’s laundry. She eyed briefly at her dirty shirt stained with tuna and mayonnaise from the onigiri filling, and something else she wasn’t even sure what it was. Maybe the chocolate from the truffles she tried (and failed) to do before giving up.  
“If you’re here it can only mean we are on the same boat,” Kyouko smirked. “Are all your shirts supposed to be pink?”  
Togami almost snarled. “No,” he spat, crossing his arm against his chest. “I apparently have forgot that I should separate colored laundry from whites”.  
“I see,” she grinned, while putting her own laundry in one of the washing machines. Then she took a seat next to him, and no one talked for a while.  
“This surprise thing is getting out of hand.”  
Kyouko glanced at Togami; for him, admitting that something was a hard task to complete wasn’t even an option. _Some things remains the same_ , she chuckled. He used to say that a Togami was capable to do amazing things. Incredible things. Ordinary things were for commoners.  
_Maybe that’s the point._  
Byakuya Togami has been raised to do extraordinary things, that’s why he wasn’t capable to do average tasks. No one ever explained to him how to wash the laundry, how to cook or clean a room. He didn’t know how to do normal chores. _And I’m not that different from him in this aspect_ she unwillingly admitted to herself. She had been raised to be a detective, and she knew little about cooking a meal. That thought led her to an idea.  
“Maybe we can help each other.”  
It was Togami’s turn to look at her suspiciously. He adjusted his glasses. “Explain yourself.”  
“I think we both agree that we aren’t really good at doing this kind of chores” she said. He didn’t reply, but the look on his face was enough. She proceeded. “So I thought we can work together instead of surrender to our defeat. I’m sure we will be able to make it if we join forces.”  
Togami looked at her in the eye, and smirked. Teasing his ego worked every time.  
“I think that’s a good suggestion” he nodded. “I mean, we are smarter than the average plebeians, and surely we’ll figure out something.”

*

“Okay, I think we should really put aside the idea of cooking a dinner from scratch.”  
Kyouko sighed. Togami was right, sadly. They both thought that two people in the kitchen would have guaranteed a successful outcome.  
Turns out, they were definitely wrong.  
After she had thrown away the poor results of their efforts, she looked at him. “What we should do then? I know I can do… something else and he well be happy the same but-”. “Okay okay, no need to go into details, thanks” he stopped her. She raised a brow: “As far as I know, you told Naegi-kun a lot of things about your sex life that he didn’t want to know”. “It was just one time” he growled. “Okay, maybe two. And I was drunk. And anyway, this will not solve our problem.”  
Kyouko sighed. “You’re right, but I honestly have no more ideas”. She lazily glanced at her phone, reading a text from Aoi. The former Swimmer asked to keep her updated with their plan, not knowing that would have been the chronicle of a disaster.  
Togami fidgeted with his glasses: “Maybe we can… order a dinner from a restaurant, and saying to Fukawa and Naegi that we made it.”  
She widened her eyes. “You want to lie to them?”. “It’s for a good cause” he insisted, “and no one will never know the truth. Just you and me. Deal?”  
Kyouko looked at him in silence. Did she really intended to lie to Makoto?  
“Deal” she nodded. It was for a good cause, she said to herself. _No one will never know._  
“Ok, so… who’s gonna call the restaurant?” she asked.  
“You, of course”.  
“Why me?”.  
“Because a Togami doesn’t belittle himself with such menial tasks”.  
“But he does with spectacular culinary destruction, am I right?”. She pointed to the mess behind their backs, still smoking.  
“I’m not the one who set the stove on fire”.  
“But you’re the one who tried to summon all the kami he knows to stop the spreading of the blue blotch”.  
“...I don’t wanna talk about that”.  
“Then you’ll talk to the phone. Giddap, giddap”.  
“I’m not a horse!”.  
“Right now you are”.  
She smiled when he dejectedly grabbed the smartphone and called the nearest restaurant, ordering a majestic meal she didn’t know he could afford (not after the disintegration of the Togami Zaibatsu, at least).  
_You’ll have to work overtime until 2060 to pay for all that food, you know?_  
“Okay, now we are settled” he said closing the call. She shrugged and agreed, not excessively proud of herself but nonetheless happy that their dastardly subterfuge would make a positive impact on their respective partners.  
The two of them were ready to take a well deserved break, while waiting for the delivery, when the door to hers and Makoto’s apartment burst open and Makoto Naegi and Touko Fukawa made their triumphant appearance in that room. Which, in that moment, resembled a bloody battlefield.  
“Asahina-san, It was nice of you to… WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED HERE? WHAT KIND OF CATACLYSM DESTROYED MY HOME?”.  
_...no way._  
He was staring with wide eyes, Touko and Aoi behind him with equally shocked faces.  
_Great, just what we needed. We got caught red-handed, without a meal and the results of our perils on open display._  
“Me and Togami. We are the cataclysm you’re looking for” she admitted, not strong enough to face him at the moment.  
“You two?” he asked, reluctant “Why did you raze our apartment to the ground?”.  
“We… we missed you two and we had the idea to do something sweet for when you would be back”.  
“Yes, it’s true” Byakuya said. “But as you can unfortunately see our best efforts led to this”. Kyouko noted that even he couldn’t face them, embarrassed and blushing (like she was).  
“Oh my god! I didn’t think that my advice would create such a catastrophe!” Aoi cried. She looked like the culprit of their damage, when of course her only fault was to bring out the idea.  
“Don’t be silly Asahina. We did it, not you”.  
“Sure, but I feel guilty…”.  
“Why? You’re not responsible for our incompetence”.  
“Incompetence?” Togami interjected “Aren’t you being a little too hard?”.  
“How would you call THAT?” she asked angrily (and her anger was mostly directed at herself) while pointing the singed plates and the horror they managed to summon in that kitchen.  
“A minor inconvenience”.  
“Minor? Like your cerebral mass?”.  
“Oh please, don’t argue!”. The stern voice of Makoto stopped the two. “I won’t speak for Fukawa-san, but I must say… I appreciate the thought. You were trying to be nice and that’s… that’s a really cute thing…”.  
_...I don’t see how can someone ask me why I fell in love with him. He’s too adorable._  
“So, Touko? Do you agree with him?” Togami asked his girlfriend. She didn’t answer with words, but the lovingly gaze she gave him was telling enough. Then she added: “Well darling, you know I love you and the gesture was very… let’s just say I love you”.  
_Oh wow. I have the distinct impression she’s refraining from telling him he’s the most colossal idiot on the face of the planet. She must really adore him. I’m jealous._  
The five stayed still for a couple of minutes, unable to say anything in the wake of that cooking nightmare. Then, in perfect Aoi style, she was the first to regain her senses: she rolled up her sleeves and said “Enough moping, people. We have a room to fix, green blobs to exterminate and a lunch to prepare”.  
“Why are you involving yourself?” asked a suspicious Byakuya. She calmly replied: “Because I’m the source of all of this. I find it fair to have my share of work”.  
_Very noble of you, Asahina._  
“About the lunch...” Kyouko tried to say, only to be interrupted by someone ringing the bell.  
“Guess who’s coming” she whispered.  
Outside the door there was the meal ordered by Togami, fit not for a king but for an army of kings. At least six delivery men were waiting, each one reciting the contents of their respective trays.  
“What is this sorcery?” asked a dumbfounded Fukawa, staring at them.  
“Your boyfriend and his lack of self control, that’s what is”.  
“I don’t lack self control! I just like things done perfectly”.  
“Your salary begs to disagree”.  
“Mind your own business, CHIEF”.  
“It’s my business, DEPUTY”.  
“You two! Would you kindly shut up and let these gentlemen enter, please?”. It was not something that happened very often, but when Makoto Naegi used that tone of voice he demanded obedience. And obedience he got.  
When the men left, those five guys were left in a bind: should they first clean the apocalypse or eat while it was warm?  
But something else was lurking beneath the surface. “I see, I see. You were trying to cook, but since you almost nuclearized this place you took the easy way out” Aoi chirped while posing some of the food on the table.  
_Can’t deny that._  
Her silence spoke volumes. The protests of her partner in crime spoke volumes too, albeit in a different manner: “Please. It was just Plan B”.  
“Plan B became reality” the Swimmer insisted in her mockery.  
“Just a safe precaution”.  
“Because you knew how it would end up, didn’t you?”.  
“I was confident we could make it”.  
“Oh yes, if you aimed to create new lifeforms you did your job”.  
“C’mon Asahina-san, don’t be too harsh on them” said Makoto “I’m sure they didn’t mean to”.  
“Of course we didn’t mean to. We were earnestly trying”.  
“And that’s why me and Makoto-kun will still talk to you from now on. Am I right?”.  
“You sure are, Fukawa-san”.  
Luckily they managed to squelch every cause of dissension. Naegi and Fukawa, while aghast at the destruction they witnessed, were willing to let it go.  
All in the name of love. And a quiet life.  
So that crazy, eventful day started in boredom and ended with five survivors eating at the same table, happy to still have friends and significant others even in the face of despair. And clumsiness.


End file.
